The 70% Rule
Get to 70% confidence, then go.
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~days to results
- Steps
- 3
- Confidence
- 95%
The 70% Rule is a decision-making heuristic Perell borrowed from a Marine Corps general who taught that in battle you must act without 100% of the information. Once you reach roughly 70% confidence, you go — anything beyond that is polishing something the market hasn't validated. It counters the biggest mistake she names: waiting to feel 100% ready, which means waiting forever. Perell applies it to websites, products, marketing, and social media, and it doubles as a team culture tool that preserves autonomy while maintaining quality. The payoff is faster time to market, where real learning actually happens.
Origin
Perell learned the 70% rule from a Marine Corps general who explained that soldiers in battle had to make decisions without 100% of the information, and she adopted it as a framework to balance analysis and action.
Core principles
- 01You will never feel 100% ready, so waiting for certainty means never moving.
- 02Anything above 70% is just perfecting something the market hasn't validated yet.
- 03You only learn whether it works once you get to market.
- 04The rule balances analysis with action under uncertain information.
- 05Applied to a team, it grants autonomy while keeping people moving.
How to run it
- 1
Gauge your confidence
Assess honestly how confident you are that a decision or product is right, on a rough percentage scale.
Watch out Waiting to feel 100% ready is the number-one mistake that stops you before you start.
- 2
Go at 70%
When you reach about 70% confidence, take the leap — launch the product, publish the site, run the campaign — rather than perfecting further.
Pro tip The sooner you meet the customer, the sooner you know if it actually works.
Watch out Time spent above 70% is spent perfecting something you cannot yet validate.
- 3
Apply it to your team
Give team members permission to move on their own judgment when they are 70% sure, and to escalate to a manager only when they are not.
Pro tip This keeps people moving and autonomous even under stricter quality standards.
Watch out Scrappy should not mean sloppy — pair autonomy with clear quality criteria.
In the wild
Approaching $10M in annual revenue, Hala Taha rolled out a 70% decision-making framework in her core values so the team kept moving under new quality standards: if you are 70% sure, go; if not, check in with your manager.
→ The team retained autonomy and momentum while raising its decision quality bar.
Common mistakes
Waiting to feel 100% ready
Perell names this the biggest of ten mistakes — if you make it you never get to the other nine, because perfection never arrives and you never ship.
Is it for you?
Best for
Founders and team leaders who over-deliberate and delay launches waiting to feel fully ready.
Not ideal for
Irreversible, high-stakes decisions where being wrong carries catastrophic, unrecoverable cost.
From the transcript
“So if I get to 70% I go.”
“The biggest mistake that I think people make is waiting to feel 100% ready.”
“You should wait till you're 70% and then go.”
From the episode
Kim Perell: 5 Execution Traits That Transform Ideas Into a $100M Business
Kim Perell